Judge rebuilding Giants virtually

Wednesday

The beauty of Zoom calls is not just what the speaker at the time may be saying, but what's going on in the other windows.

Joe Judge says he does notice how the players are interacting during Giants' virtual meetings when someone else may be doing the talking.

It's truly an NFL fish bowl.

While the players and coaches are not even in the same room, impressions are already being made.

"When there’s an assistant coach presenting, everybody in there is also presenting themselves and how they conduct themselves in a meeting," Judge said during a video conference with reporters Tuesday night. "You’re looking around, how’s the guy set up in his house? Is it a quiet setting? How is he dressed? What’s his eye focus like? Are his eyes down? Is he trying to text?

“We haven’t had a lot of that. We’ve had a lot of guys with great urgency. You have the opportunity in this setting here to really see your players in a meeting standpoint where they really can’t hide."

The Giants get two hours of remote learning a day with the veterans, and now the rookies are blended into the fold. Adapting to online learning has been a challenge for all involved, and while Judge won't get a complete evaluation of who they are as football players until they get on the practice field, every piece of information tells a story.

"We’re always creating an impression,“ Judge said. ”We’re always forming an opinion of ourselves. But along with that, let’s not get confused. We’re not going to evaluate a football team based purely on how they are on a computer. We can go down to Circuit City and find a great football team on a computer."

It's where the Giants are forced to start their rebuild of one, however.

Here are four more takeaways on what Judge shared:

Cowboy up

Dak Prescott completed 67.8 percent of his passes with 23 touchdowns and four interceptions as a fourth-round rookie in Jason Garrett's system with the Cowboys.

Seems like Prescott did well in learning Garrett's offense quickly, and that will be the challenge for Daniel Jones, albeit with the wrinkle of having to do a lot of it away from the field.

From a schematic standpoint, the Giants will look a lot like the offense the Cowboys ran when Garrett, now their offensive coordinator.

"The easiest way to describe it to the outside world right now is it’s going to be similarly based off what Jason’s done in Dallas over the last 10 or so years. There are going to be some similarities carried over from that, but it has to cater to our players we have on our roster currently," Judge said.

The Giants will not be keeping much if any of the elements with which Jones grew familiar under former coach Pat Shurmur, so he's learning a brand new offense under challenging circumstances.

"There is a lot of familiarity in the terminology and the verbiage that he uses that I’ve heard when I worked at Alabama under [Nick] Saban. A lot of that comes from crossover of offensive coordinators that they work alongside in Miami together," Judge added.

A defensive chameleon

The Giants want to look a lot differently on defense each week. Whether they have the personnel to execute the game plan defensive coordinator Patrick Graham and Judge would like to have remains to be seen.

"We’ll be a team that’s multiple by game plan and how we have to matchup and attack the opponent," Judge said. "The elements of the defense you can really look through and what it will closely resemble will really be the other stops that Patrick has been along his way that I have been there as well. The New England system, some of the Houston system, the Tennessee system, the Miami system. Those families of defense will be the biggest influences that go into ours. Of course, ours will be mostly dictated by the players we have in the games."

The status of Markus Golden

Judge has spoken with free agent Markus Golden, and the Giants would like their pass rusher to return, but at their price. It's one of the reasons they used the "May 5" tender that gives the team leverage if Golden remains unsigned on the first day of training camp, currently scheduled for July 22.

If that happens, Golden would only be able to play for the Giants on a one-year contract worth 110 percent of his salary last season ($4.125 million).

"I have a lot of respect for him as a player. He’s a great person, he’s a hard worker. He’s a productive player so we have a lot of respect for him. He’s definitely someone that I have spoken to in terms of possibly adding to the roster," Judge said, adding: "We have an interest in Markus, we’ve talked to him. We are going through the procedure right now. We’re going to let it play out a little bit and see where everything shakes out."

Finding leaders

"The interesting thing is, early on in this process, I think we all had a lot of question marks in terms of how we are going to see relationships, how we are going to see leadership, how are we going to see all this emerge," Judge said. "Naturally it always comes to the surface."

The Giants can't watch the players interact on the field or in the weight room. They're not hanging around the locker room, the cafeteria or in the training room together.

But Judge believes he is already seeing leadership emerge from his group, albeit remotely from their residences spread across the country.

"You can see a lot of guys from interactions in meetings. You can see who is going to take the reins and start the communication," Judge said. "You can identify from different players who is standing out front and organizing some extra communication exercises on their own at the time. You still have the ability to see who is stepping out in front.“

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